Most Helpful Customer Reviews
|
|
35 of 43 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
This Classic Remains a Classic, October 31, 2003
In the fourteen years since the debut of this remarkable work, Professor Fingarette's book continues to be vilified by the current Alcoholism-as-Disease paradigm as a sham, harmful to its readers, and that it should be banned from all major book stores. It is simply amazing how this book struck the paradigm at its core, and how they haven't gotten over the hangover.This book is truth at its simplistic best. It is cumbersome to admit one's own culpability, and even harder for an alcoholic to admit that he is his own worst enemy. I know. I was one. After years of living in fear of the next drink, which surely would lead me to a single, inexorable destructive conclusion, works like Dr. Fingarette's "Heavy Drinking" had shown me that I was creating my own self-fulfilling prophecy, and that I indeed had the power to change, not just one day at a time, but forever. Of course, this idea flies in the face of those who promote the disease concept of alcoholism. Naturally, the multi-billion dollar institution will not tell you that they have done nothing to help the addiction situation since the AMA self-servingly declared alcoholism to be an illness in 1956. They continue to tell the public that the alcohol problem continues to skyrocket. The harshest attack on Dr. Fingarette's book is his assertion that alcoholics can learn to control their drinking. It has been proven time and again by several major studies since the 1960s. And yet, the disease camp, founded by the old unfounded addage "Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic" spends countless millions in government-funded dollars promoting the idea that this is impossible. They have to. If they admitted that it was possible, their very essence would be threatened, and the industry would collapse. Bravo to Dr. Fingarette for having the guts to stand firm in the face of such pressure and present the truth. It is only by the presence of more secure individuals like the good doctor when a real answer can be offered to those who abuse alcohol and drugs. The keys to success are motivation, values, morality (yes, what's wrong with living a morally decent life?), and maturity. Life is worth living, and the same joy that was once found in a bottle can be found inside the joys of parenthood, work, and success.
|
|
|
36 of 45 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Alcoholism is a Serious Problem, But It's Not a Disease, June 22, 2001
In 7 chapters, Herbert Fingarette, formerly a professor of philosophy at UC Santa Barbara, dispels the myth that alcoholism is a disease, while taking very seriously the social problem of alcoholic behavior. In 1960 E. M. Jellinek published a book titled THE DISEASE CONCEPT OF ALCOHOLISM (p. 20). Alcoholics Anonymous members adopted this book as their scientific basis for asserting that alcoholism is a disease. But Jellinek's data was compiled by interviewing A.A. members. Thus, his conclusions were based on the reasoning of the very people who came to endorse his book. Furthermore, his research was based on only 98 interviews. Today, the politics of alcoholism is big business (pp. 22 ff.). Conceiving of it as a disease enables treatment centers to receive payments from health insurance companies. If somebody has cancer, you don't say, "You foolish person! You have cancer!" But when it comes to alcoholism, it is not unusual to find the relapsing drinker to be accused of having done something wrong. Many think the alcoholic, unlike the "canceric," has control. This, Fingarette argues, is in an important sense true, and shows the disanalogy between the disease of cancer and the PROBLEM of alcoholism. (Have you ever noticed that "alcoholic" is the dominant "-ic" in the U.S.? If you examine the word "alcohol," what is added to it is only "-ic." But when a person has a fancy for, say, chocolate, we don't say, "chocolatic," but rather "chocoholic." "Holic" always makes its way in, so obsessed are we as a society with alcohol.) Heavy drinkers -- as Fingarette refers to what others call "alcoholics" -- do not become heavy drinkers for just one reason. Therefore, it is unclear that treatment should consist of just one variety. Twelve-step programs, in our society, play a role like that of various forms of fundamentalism both here and abroad, reducing problems to a formulaic response that is often insulting at best, and deadly at worst. The person is by-passed because the program directors "know" what the right thing is for the "patient" to do. Controlled drinking programs are available in many countries (p. 128). In Europe, attitudes toward drinking are remarkably different from attitudes in the U.S., and these differences often make a difference in the way people actually drink. Stigmatizing behavior often reinforces the very negative behavior it seeks to prevent, especially in a country like the U.S. where rebellion is schizophrenically considered a virtue. Fingarette discusses the GENETIC HYPOTHESIS on pp. 51-55. This is very important: IT HAS NOT BEEN PROVED. I have spoken with several substance abuse counselors who very nonchalantly remark, as though possessing conclusive scientific authority to do so, "It's genetic." We don't know that. We don't know that 12 steps to recovery is the gospel. Agents of recovery should consider adopting a more epistemically modest stance. But although this book would help them make a move in that direction, they can't afford to. Literally.
|
|
|
21 of 26 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Paradigm breaking., June 12, 1999
By A Customer
Simply, the best book I've read on "alcoholism." After you've read the book, you'll see why I've used the quotes. Brief, but crisply written, intellectual, cogent, and penetrating, it's one of those few books that changed my way of looking at things.
|
|
|
Most Recent Customer Reviews
|
by Ph.D. Jeffrey A. Schaler
by Herbert Fingarette
See all Editorial Reviews
